I had too busy a schedule and was not planning to watch television when the Gujarat election results were supposed to be declared. But my colleagues insisted that I must watch at least some news channel, even if just for entertainment! So I sat in front of the TV; and while surfing channels, I saw a lot of important journalists and analysts on Times Now and decided to stay there for a while.

Honestly, I could not but help a Bangla expletive escape my mouth when I heard what some experts were saying. One was saying that Narendra Modi and his electoral victory was against the Constitution of India. Another was saying how the Gujarat verdict goes against the spirit of India and how the Idea of India is in danger. I always thought free and fair elections were a celebration of the Constitution, democracy and the Idea of India. So what was all this nonsense talk all about? The more I watched and the more I followed analysts in other news channels, I realized something simple: these individuals were very unhappy that Modi had won and they clearly would have preferred his loss. I also realized they hate him in a very irrational manner. For example, one person went on and on about how Modi is bad because he encourages a personality cult that revolves around Modi. Interestingly, nobody in that particular news panel found time to mention how more than 60 welfare schemes of the government are named after the Gandhi family. If that is not personality cult, what is? Someone else in some channel said that Modi is dictatorial and doesn’t allow any leader or voice to prosper under him. Then I thought, what is Congress if not dictatorial? Can any chief minister of any Congress-ruled state defy the central leadership the way Modi has repeatedly done? What will be the Congress minister’s fate if that happens? For that matter, I honestly think that at least some of the young Congress leaders – ranging from Sachin Pilot to Jyotiraditya Scindia to Milind Deora and some others – are better equipped to handle India than Rahul Gandhi. But not a single panelist in any TV channel was saying any of this.

So let us sum up something: the first thing is that most English media types absolutely hate Narendra Modi. That is all right. Even journalists have every right to hate someone. But I wondered how Modi’s victory could destroy India, the way so many senior journalists were complaining. So I asked my colleagues to note down the reasons why the English journalists hate Modi. The results were interesting. The first reason was that Modi is anti-Muslim and communal. The related reason was that Modi has apparently never apologized for the 2002 riots. The second reason was that he is interested only in projecting himself. The third reason was that he is supposedly a dictator and a fascist. And the fourth reason was that his claims of a developed Gujarat are, the journalists claim, hollow. Read more....